DAIRY PRODUCE EXPORTS

Taranaki Daily News, 3 April 1934, Page 16

DAIRY PRODUCE EXPORTS

NEW ZEALAND’S PROBLEM p NEGOTIATIONS WITH BRITAIN. EMPIRE COUNTRIES CONCERNED.

'“The members of the. Dairy Produce Board will be meeting the Cabinet on April 12, and the matter of negotiations with" Great Britain will then be fully discussed,” said Mr. W. A. lorns, chairman of the board, in a telephone conversation from Martinborough with the New Zealand Herald on Monday night. Tiie reference was to the advice received from the High Commissioner for New Zealand in London, Sir James Parr, that no good purpose could be served by sending a delegation to Britain in connection with the present difficulties of the dairying industry.

“Some alternative to the present situation will have to be found,” continued Mr. lorns. “The Home Government has arranged to” subsidise the English milk producer until the Ottawa Agreement runs out. Even if we are prepared to talk restrictions it appears that the authorities in England are reluctant to do so.”

Any agreement with Britain could not be confined to New Zealand alone. All other Empire countries were concerned. Australia was now a great butter producing country. The New Zealand cheese output was also at stake. Canada, with its declining output, was not so much affected. The imports of cheese into Great Britain during the past five years had been more or less stationary, though butter importations had increased enormously.

“The only hope,” said Mr. lorns, “seems to be that some of the tariff walls and quota restrictions into European countries may break down and their populations may be able to buy more butter. In Russia. butter is costing the people 5s 4d per lb., and imports into Germany were restricted with a consequent price of between 3s and 3s 6d per lb. When I was in England last year, Holland had appointed a special committee dealing with butter prices. The retail price in that country was then Is lOd per lb., and they were exporting thousands of tons to England, taking a lower retail price than either New Zealand or Australia. Butter imports into France are entirely prohibited and the price there is in the neighbourhood of 3s per lb.” All these countries, continued Mr. lorns, were dumping butter on to the Home market, the only one at the moment open to New Zealand. Unlike the European countries, New Zealand had no large consuming public for her butter, and thus no local remedy for the situation. It was hoped that negotiations would be possible before the Ottawa Agreement ran out. The Governments of New Zealand and Britain were in constant communication on the matter, and it was hoped that some amicable agreement could be reached.